Former President Donald Trump on Wednesday reacted to the death of longtime conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh, saying that he was “irreplaceable.” The decades-long staple of talk radio passed away at the age of 70 on Wednesday after a battle with lung cancer.

Hopping onto Fox News over the phone to offer some words, the former president opened by talking about the controversial move to give Limbaugh the Presidential Medal of Freedom at the 2020 State of the Union, which Trump said was “a great honor.”

“Half the room went crazy” Trump said about when he gave Limbaugh the medal “and the other half of the room, they knew he should get it.”

“But it was special and he was special,” he added.

Asked by Fox News host Bill Hemmer about when he last spoke to Limbaugh, the former commander-in-chief said “three or four days ago.”

“His fight [against cancer] was very, very courageous and he was very, very sick and—from diagnosis on—it was just something that was just not going to be beaten, but you wouldn’t know it,” Trump said.

“He is married to an incredible woman, Kathryn, who really—every time I spoke to him, he would tell me how great she was—she took such great care.”

“He was very brave,” Trump continued. “I mean, he in theory could’ve been gone four months ago. Really, he was fighting till the very end. He was a fighter, he was a great gentleman.”

Hemmer then asked how Trump viewed the way Limbaugh chose to “carry on” his messages and chose to agree or disagree with his policies as president.

Not directly answering the question, Trump referenced Fox News host Sean Hannity, who was on the program before he came on, saying that “Sean would say ‘There is nobody like Rush.'”

The former president also called the late radio host “irreplaceable” and “unique”.

Trump went on to talk about Limbaugh’s show and his hosting style.

“He had an audience that was massive,” Trump said. “And, you know, he could do something […] and he would get up in the show and would just talk—he wouldn’t take phone calls where, you know, people would call in every two minutes and that’s sort of easy to do—he would just talk, for two hours and three hours, just talk. And that’s not an easy thing to do.

“I once asked him and said ‘Do you study for the show?’ and he said ‘Actually, I study very hard,'” Trump continued, joking that the revelation “a little bit surprised me.”

“But he was a fantastic man, fantastic talent, and people—whether they loved him or not—they respected him, they really did,” he said at the closing of his segment.

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